They’ve been doing it in ships on the ocean for decades, but no one has thought of providing gaming action in the air before, until now. Sheldon Adelson, owner of the Venetian Resorts in Vegas and Macau, has come up with the brainstorm of ferrying high rollers from China to Vegas and breaking open the baccarat tables at 30,000 feet of altitude.

The revenue possibilities for these trips could be very big. For one thing, they will be traveling in international air space and will not be taxed by any country. Vegas revenues are taxed 6.75%, and Macau taxes are a whopping 40%.

They will be offering baccarat action as soon as they purchase two Lockheed wide-bodied jets and begin to offer flights. There are laws that prohibit gambling on flights into, and out of, the U.S. But private flights are exempt from the 1994 amendment that prohibits the airborne action.

Chinese New Year is the biggest time of year for Vegas Strip baccarat action. The ten-day celebration can provide the lion’s share of the baccarat action for the year, with last year’s wagers totalling over $1B for the month of February. That put $116.4M into the revenue stream for the casinos. That translates into 2.9% of total business.

The MGM Mirage, Las Vegas Sands and Wynn Resorts have all opened casinos in Macau and they have been promoting Vegas as a Chinese New Year destination. The ten-day celebration allows visitors a longer-than-usual visit to the city, and the free-flowing Asian gambling dollar is becoming much more desirable to Vegas casino owners.

The casinos would rather see the Asian gaming dollar spent in Vegas because the gaming tax is 6.75% in the U.S., as compared to the 39% they must pay to the Chinese government in Macau.

Poker, even though it has been around for what seems like forever, has taken the pop culture world of gambling by storm with is own list of celebrities, groupies and the like. Trends always come and go so my prediction is that the game of Baccarat may be soon dealing its own version of gaming celebrities.

As you probably already know the famous 007’s game of choice is baccarat. “Casino Royale” the newest of the James Bond movies was adapted from Ian Flemmings novel with the same title. In Flemming’s version, the British Bond out bets the Russian Le Chiffer – (Le Chiffer’s name being a play on the game Baccarat Chemin de Fer). However, if you’ve gotten a chance to see the movie, you’ve noticed that this version passes on that idea and opts for a showdown between the 2 at a game of poker.

This change is enough to take notice of pokers popularity but, back in reality, Macau, the new casino hot spot, Baccarat seems to be the game of choice. The Sands Macao casino claims that it has the most gambling tables of any other casino in the world, and most of them are baccarat. Also the newer Wynn Macau Casino has 200 gambling tables and again, baccarat is the dominant table on the floor.

Across the ocean in North America on the Las Vegas strip some of the most important players are Asian and most of them high rollers betting up to millions of dollars inside the VIP salons on baccarat.

If you want to take an early jump on my predicted new gambling trend you might want to start brushing up on your game. Here’s a list of online casinos that can clean up your skills or get you started:

- Bettor’s Luck
- Online baccarat
- Golden Tiger
- Bodog
- Latest casino bonuses